Srila Prabhupada - Vedic Teachings

  Prabhupāda: Universal means all. You have to love everyone. Guest: If I didn't love the cow as equally with a child, then it is a personal love, because I'm defining qualifications. Prabhupāda: But how can you avoid this personal? Guest: Because to love the child only, I have to exclude other things, meaning the cow. Prabhupāda : But personal . . . child is the person. How can you avoid person? Guest: How can what? Prabhupāda: How can you avoid person? Guest: I don't understand. Prabhupāda: When you love, how can you avoid a person? What do you mean by love? Whenever you love universally . . . in the universe there are so many men, animals, and plants and beasts and birds, and so many things. So we have to love everyone. That is universal. You cannot discriminate, "Oh, this is not universal; this is universal." Universal means all-including. So how you can avoid this person or imperson? You have to love everyone. That is universal. Gues...

  A person may have a bona fide spiritual master and may be attached to a spiritual organization, but still, if he is not intelligent enough to make progress, then Kṛṣṇa from within gives him instructions so that he may ultimately come to Him without difficulty. The qualification is that a person always engage himself in Kṛṣṇa consciousness and with love and devotion render all kinds of services. He should perform some sort of work for Kṛṣṇa, and that work should be with love. If a devotee is intelligent enough, he will make progress on the path of self-realization. If one is sincere and devoted to the activities of devotional service, the Lord gives him a chance to make progress and ultimately attain to Him.  (From BG 10.10, Purport)    

  „ Śrīla Prabhupada: …. We should be very much cautious: “For my sinful actions my spiritual master will suffer, so I’ll not commit even a pinch of sinful activities.” That is the duty of the disciple. After initiation, all sinful reaction is finished. Now if he again commits sinful activities, his spiritual master has to suffer. A disciple should be sympathetic and consider this. “For my sinful activities, my spiritual master will suffer.” If the spiritual master is attacked by some disease, it is due to the sinful activities of others. “Don’t make many disciples.” But we do it because we are preaching. Never mind—let us suffer—still we shall accept them. Therefore your question was—when I suffer is it due to my past misdeeds? Was it not? That is my misdeed—that I accepted some disciples who are nonsense. That is my misdeed. Bob: This happens on occasions? Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes. This is sure to happen because we are accepting so many men. It is the duty of the disciples to...

  „For logicians who want to accept only that which is proven through logic and argument, it is a fact that without logic and reason there can be no question of accepting the Absolute Truth. Unfortunately, when such logicians take to this path without the mercy of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, they remain on the platform of logic and argument and do not advance in spiritual life. However, if one is intelligent enough to apply his arguments and logic to the subtle understanding of the fundamental spiritual substance, he will be able to know that a poor fund of knowledge established on the basis of material logic cannot help one understand the Absolute Truth, which is beyond the reach of imperfect senses. The Mahābhārata therefore says, acintyāḥ khalu ye bhāvā na tāṁs tarkeṇa yojayet. (Mahābhārata, Bhīṣma-parva 5.22) How can that which is beyond the imagination or sensory speculation of mundane creatures be approached simply by logic? Logic and argument are very poor in spiritual strength...

  "So vadanti tat tattva-vidas tattvam. Those who know what is Absolute Truth, they say that is the Absolute Truth which is advaya-jñāna. Advaya-jñāna means without any duality. Just like here in this material world it is called dual world, duality. Everything cannot be understood absolutely. If I say . . . it is a, rather in ordinary language, relative world. Here everything is relative. Just like if I say: "father," "father" has no meaning if there is no son. Duality. If I say: "good," so unless I have got idea of bad, I cannot understand good. If I say "light," unless I have got conception of darkness, I cannot understand light. So here everything is duality, relative knowledge, relative world, but in the absolute world everything is one, spirit. Here . . . because here we have got experience two energies, spiritual energy and material energy, working. The material energies are the physical elements, bhūmir āpo 'nalo vāyuḥ (BG 7.4): e...

  Upendra: Prabhupāda, sometimes there may be differences between what is love of Godhead between Christian and Moslem, Moslem and Buddhist, Buddhist, Hindu. They may quarrel at what is love of Godhead. Prabhupāda: The quarrel, they, those who are not in love of Godhead, they must quarrel. That is the... Because they are cats and dogs. You cannot expect any peaceful condition between cats and dogs. They will fight. So whatever they may be, so long they are fighting, that means they are not on the perfectional stage. Where is the fighting? If you love God, then you love everyone. That is the sign. Samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām (BG 18.54). After attaining the stage of equality, then you can enter into the realm of loving God. Before that, you have to pass. Just like before entering law college you have to become graduate, similarly, before entering the realm of devotional service you have to realize that all living entities are on the same platform. That is reali...

  So we should try to love God. Not demand anything. Demand is already supplied. Even the cats and dogs are getting their necessities. They don't go to the church or ask anything from God, but they are getting. So why a devotee shall not get? If a cat or dog can get his necessities of life without demanding from God, why shall I demand from God, that "Give me this, give me that." No. We shall simply try to love Him. That will fulfill everything. That is called highest platform of yoga. (From Lecture on BG 6.46-47 -- Los Angeles, February 21, 1969)

  …in our ISKCON there are so many false things: "Prabhupada said this, Prabhupada said that." (From Letter to Krsnadasa -- Vrindaban 7 November, 1972 THE END

Duties on the spiritual platform and duties on the material platform may be different, but the principle of following the authorized direction is always good for the performer. When one is under the spell of the modes of material nature, one should follow the prescribed rules for his particular situation and should not imitate others. For example, a brāhmaṇa, who is in the mode of goodness, is nonviolent, whereas a kṣatriya, who is in the mode of passion, is allowed to be violent. As such, for a kṣatriya it is better to be vanquished following the rules of violence than to imitate a brāhmaṇa who follows the principles of nonviolence. Everyone has to cleanse his heart by a gradual process, not abruptly. However, when one transcends the modes of material nature and is fully situated in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he can perform anything and everything under the direction of a bona fide spiritual master. In that complete stage of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the kṣatriya may act as a brāhmaṇa, or a brāh...

  Nonviolence is generally taken to mean not killing or destroying the body, but actually nonviolence means not to put others into distress. People in general are trapped by ignorance in the material concept of life, and they perpetually suffer material pains. So, unless one elevates people to spiritual knowledge, one is practicing violence. One should try his best to distribute real knowledge to the people, so that they may become enlightened and leave this material entanglement. That is nonviolence. (From Bhagavad-gita As It Is (1972) 13.8-12 Purport)

  Prabhupāda: Those days or in these days, the same principles are there. Kṣatriyas should fight for Kṛṣṇa. That is his perfection of life. Guest (2): Okay. Then the question is whom shall we fight now? Okay, supposing we are all... Prabhupāda: Those who are not Kṛṣṇa conscious. Yes. Guest (2): Fight in a real..., sword, fight with swords? Prabhupāda: The demons. Demons. Demons. Just like Lord Rāmacandra fought with the demons, so similarly, Kṛṣṇa conscious person will fight with the demons. That is already there. Demons and demigod always fight. Devāsura-yuddha, you know? That is history. We don't say that fighting should be stopped. We don't say that. We don't say that becoming Kṛṣṇa conscious, nonviolence. That is bogus. In Delhi when there was not..., declaration of war between Pakistan and India, press representative came: "Swamiji, what is your opinion about this fight?" I said, "You must fight." And it was published in the paper. It g...